


The Many Joys of Collective Insanity

by Misswhy



Category: White Collar
Genre: F/M, Pre-Slash, pre-kidfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-13
Updated: 2010-03-13
Packaged: 2017-10-07 22:49:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/70053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Misswhy/pseuds/Misswhy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Neal. Peter and I have decided to give the fertility clinic another try, and we would be honored if you would be the donor."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Many Joys of Collective Insanity

Neal and Peter had been partners for a little less than two years when Elizabeth found the picture. She was turning the pockets of Peters jacket inside out before laundry, and there it was. It was black and white and a bit ratty, but she couldn't tell how old it was, exactly. It was of a boy in a yard, a bicycle at his side, big grin on his rather adorable face. He had short, dark hair and light eyes that were somewhat familiar. Elizabeth turned to Peter, who was taking a beer out of the fridge. It was early afternoon, he’d just gotten home from a long day’s work. She asked him what it was, the photo, and had a sharp sense of déjà vu when his face said, _shit, I forgot to remove that_.

“It’s Neal’s,” he said. “I confiscated it today, forgot to give it back.”

There was a bit of a story there, Elizabeth could tell and she didn’t know quite where to start.

“Who is it?” She asked.

“It’s Neal,” Peter said, joining her on the couch, the big pile of laundry between them. Elizabeth looked at the photo again, she could see it now.

“He was a cute kid,” she said with a smile. Peter frowned, took a sip of his beer

“Yeah, the woman he tried conning into thinking it was his son thought so too,” Peter said. He looked up at the ceiling, resting his head on the back of the couch and Elizabeth couldn’t see enough of his face to read him. But that was a tell of it’s own.

“Why did he do that?” she asked.

“It doesn’t matter, it wasn’t important,” he said. He sounded tired.

“She was a mother,” Elizabeth guessed, “so showing her a picture of his imaginary son was a good way of bonding with her and win her trust.”

“Yes, something like that,” Peter answered.

“And it made you angry,” Elizabeth said. “That he would take it so lightly. Lying about having a child.”

“Yes, Peter said.” He finally looked at her, and his face was naked. It made Elizabeth’s chest ache. She climbed across the couch, pushing the laundry to the floor in the process. She curled up in his lap, rested her head on his chest. Peter stroked her hair.

*

Elizabeth tried to forget about it, and she did a pretty good job until a sunny Saturday Shopping Spree with Neal a couple of weeks later. He helped her pick out outfits for her events, had for over a year now, and it was fun, usually.

What was not so fun was running into an acquaintance form her old job, Joanna-from-the-office-down-the-hall, who Elizabeth remembered as a dry twig, but now had her adorable two month-old baby boy in a baby carriage and was the proudest, most annoying glowing young mother.

Neal clued in fast enough and ran interference and afterwards he escorted her to a quiet corner with a bench and let her sit there for a while.

He came back with coffee and pastries and lots of paper napkins. She gave him a smile for thanks and they ate in silence and if Elizabeth used the napkins as much on her eyes as she did on her mouth, Neal pretended not to notice.

“I’m sorry,” he said, finally. “I hadn’t realized it mattered so much to you.”

“It doesn’t,” she said and tried to keep her voice steady, “not anymore. We gave up trying years ago.”

Neal didn't say anything, didn't, reach out, but his body language said Attentive Listener, Go On Telling Me All Your Secrets, You Can Trust Me, I’m Your Friend and Elizabeth knew that yes, he really was. Had been for at least a year. Peter even trusted him. Mostly.

“We‘ve tried everything,” she said. “Everything we could afford, short an anonymous donor.”

“Why not?” Neal asked.

“Peter- Peter’s not comfortable with it. Not because it wouldn’t be his child, but because we wouldn’t know whose-”

“It would be yours,” Neal said. “You’d still be the mother, and Peter would be a wonderful father. Genes only means so much, trust me on that one,” and his smile was supposed to be light, but Elizabeth knows exactly how much he wasn’t joking. Neal knew who his real parents were, but the yard in picture was his foster parents’, not the first ones and not the last.

“You would be wonderful parents,” he said, then fell quiet. He looked away, at the people going by in the street.

“Kate was pregnant once,” he said. Elizabeth stared at him. She didn’t know that, she didn't even think that Peter knew that, and the shock made her let go of a bit of the old misery.

“It wasn’t planned,” he said, and his smile was wry. Elizabeth can see the irony; Neal Caffrey, always full of grand plans and then something like that.

“We had never even talked about children, but- we wanted it,” he said.

“What happened?” she asked when he didn't seem to continue on his own.

“She had a miscarriage. She hadn‘t even started to show, we never knew if it was a boy or a girl.”

Elizabeth scooted closer to him and took his hand.

“When was this?” she asked.

“About a year before Peter caught me for the first time,” he said.

“Do you think it would have changed anything?” she asked.

He shrugged; who knew. She did math in her head; his son or daughter would had been around seven by now.

“Oh Neal. I’m so sorry,” she said and then she needed to dry her eyes again.

“Shhh, Elizabeth, it’s okay. It was a long time ago. I’m sorry I brought it up,” he said and hugged her, tight and real

"I'm sorry it happened to you, but I'm not sorry you told me," She said. Her voice was muffled against his shoulder, he gave her an extra squeeze and stroked her back.

"Come, let's get you those shoes you where drooling over earlier, and then we'll go home and make Peter endure a fashion show. Does that sound like a plan?" Neal said, letting her go gently. Elizabeth gave him a grateful smile

"Yes. That sounds very much like a plan."

*

Peter became restless and preoccupied. He spent long days in the office, a habit Neal and Elizabeth had almost had him cured of. He snapped at Jones and Cruz, he almost ripped some agent‘s head off when the idiot implied that Neal was less than trustworthy (It was Neal that told Elizabeth these things, not directly, but he was not immune to her careful prodding), and he returned to the habit of frequently checking Neal’s GPS-map.

The second anniversary for Peter and Neal’s partnership was coming up. It shouldn’t had taken Elizabeth this long to figure out what was bothering Peter.

“Honey, it‘s still two more years.” She told him that evening when they were preparing dinner. She was taking care of the main dish, Peter was making the salad. Neal would be joining them, but he wasn’t here yet, and Peter worried; he was making a mess of the apples and almost took a finger off when Elizabeth said,

“Peter, relax, he isn’t going to disappear anytime soon.”

“Shit,” Peter said, and went to the sink to clean the cut.

“Let me see that.” She said and reached for his hand. The cut was long, but superficial; a band-aid would do. “Honey, be careful.”

“I know, sorry. It‘s just… these two years has gone so _fast_.” He said, pressing a piece of paper towel against his finger.

“And they’ve been _good_.” She supplied for him and got him a band-aid from the weird stuff-drawer. She put it on and kissed his finger.

“He‘s our friend. Of course you don’t want him to be gone the minute the tracker comes off. I don‘t want that either.”

“He won‘t stay, El.” He said, looking down at his hands. “He‘s been chained to New York too long, he’ll want to travel and-”

“And then when he‘s done with his vacation, he will come back to us, and the bureau and June and Mozzie. He’ll realize that he has family here.” She turned away from him and put her attention back to her cooking; she never could lie directly to Peter’s face.

Neal was family, that much was true, but she was afraid that by the time he realized it, it would be too late

That evening, Elizabeth watched as the tension leaked out of her husbands shoulders and his smile returned as they ate and Neal entertained them with long, convoluted tales from the art-underworld, only vaguely related to his and Peter’s current case and she didn't, she really, really didn't want to loose this from their life.

*

She was thirty-six and the slow yearning in her cells was turning into a roar that was growing by the minute. Her body knew it was almost over, her window of reproductively was closing. This was the last chance.

She was rough with Peter that night, her desperation feeding her passion and afterwards, when he was holding her tight and looking dazed at nothing and still catching his breath, hot tears began to spill, landed on Peter’s chest and she couldn't control her sobbing, didn't try to.

“El, baby, what‘s wrong?” he sat up and held her at arms length. He looked a bit scared of her, but his voice was gentle.

“My cycle is starting to change, it‘s getting longer and longer between- I think it’ll be too late soon,” she said between her sobs and watched his face crumble.

“Oh, El…” He hold her close while she cried herself dry and kept her stocked with paper towels from the bedside table.

“We could try again, with the clinic.” He said slowly, when she was calm again and the hitch in her breath was the only thing left of her crying. “Or we could adopt.”

“I think we‘re too old, Peter. They want young parents, don‘t you think?” She didn't know anything about what kind of parents they gave adoptive children to these days, it wasn’t something she’d ever looked into. The truth was that she was selfish and greedy: she wanted to give birth to her own children and she wanted Peter to be the father. She was ashamed of this, because she knew that if she’d only accepted reality years ago, they could have had teenage children by now, and Peter should have had that. He should have had the chance to bee the overprotective father who told his daughter to be home by eleven and threatened her dates and wouldn’t let her leave the house without a canister of pepper spray, or who tried not to blush as he told his son about the dangers of unsafe sex , who-

“You know I‘m not comfortable with an anonymous donor,” Peter said and brought her back to reality, “and I know this sounds crazy, but hear me out: maybe it wouldn’t have to be someone anonymous. I haven‘t got anyone in mind, but we- we could get an acquaintance to be the donor, someone we trusted. A friend. ”

She turned his words over in her mind. It was not a bad idea. They would have to choose carefully, and…

They didn’t actually have that many close male friends, she realized suddenly, and she could see the exact moment the same thought stroke Peter. He flopped down on the bed, staring at the ceiling.

“That’s crazy, El, it would be crazy. It would be _insane_.”

“It is, I know. But we wanted to find a way to keep him from running the moment the tracker comes off. I think this would do the trick,” she said, which made Peter laugh.

”And I think it would make him happy. I’d like that.”

”Me too, El. Me too,” Peter said and held her.

*

They were so nervous the next time Neal came to dinner. It had been a week since they got their crazy idea and Neal knew something was up. He pulled Elizabeth aside under the excuse of helping her in the kitchen and asked her, ”El, what is _up _with Peter? He’s been really, seriously strange this last week.”

Elizabeth laughed, but couldn’t hide her nervousness; she dried her hands on her pants and shoot a look at the fridge, where the picture of Neal had ended up, next to a picture of Satchmo. Neal followed her gaze and said, ”Oh.”

”Peter was going to give it back-”

”No, keep it, it looks good there,” and he looked happy, so she left it. They were quiet for a moment.

”There is something Peter and I want to talk to you about. We might as well do it now, get the weirdness out of the way,” she said and saw the look of alarm that Neal quickly hid. She guided him into the living room with a hand on the small of his back and pushed him down in a chair, turned off the television and sat down next to Peter, who had been watching a game of football.

”We need to work on our poker faces, honey, we’ve been freaking Neal out.”

”We’re doing this now?” Peter asked with alarm.

”Should I be calling my lawyer? ” Neal smiled, but he was really not fooling them; he was freaked out. And scared, Elizabeth thought. Even after two years, Neal would sometimes be uncertain that he was really welcome in their home.

”Neal. Peter and I have decided to give the fertility clinic another try and we would be honored if you would be the donor,” she said and tried not to burst out laughing at the expression on Neal’s face.

”…you’re not joking,” he said, when he had gotten his speech back. ”Oh my god, you’re _serious_. You want _me_\- Are you _nuts_?”

“We‘ve thought this through, Neal,” Peter said, “We trust you.”

“You _are_ nuts!”

“Neal, you‘ve been Peter‘s partner for two years,” Elizabeth said, “”You have saved his life at least four times. You’re our friend.”

Neal just stared at them.

“Are there any _medical_ reasons why it shouldn't be you?” Peter asked, trying for another tactic.

“…No, not that I know of. You already know of my less than stellar dating choices, and if you don‘t mind the child inheriting that…”

“It‘s not an issue.” Peter said.

Neal ran his hands through his hair and took a deep breath. “Okay, let‘s assume we do this thing - what if people guesses, what if the kid come out looking too much like me?”

Elizabeth and Peter looked at each other; more a silent discussion of who was going to answer Neal’s question than a loss of words. They had discussed this. It was just a bit harder in practice than in theory.

“It might not,” Peter said. “It might be a girl, who looks like her mother.” He gave her a fond smile, and Elizabeth suddenly wanted to cry.

“But if it‘s a boy-” Neal said.

“It won‘t matter.” Peter interrupted. “In two years your anklet comes off and then we don‘t have to stay in New York-”

Neal opened his mouth, clearly about to interrupt Peter, but he was at a loss for words. Elizabeth knew Peter had screwed up.

“Neal, honey, Peter said that wrong. What he means is, it won‘t matter to us if the child looks like you. He also tried to say that we can _all_ go live somewhere else if we have to. Neal, look at me. We are not going to take the child away from you or keep you from being a part of his or hers life.”

Neal shifted in the chair, still agitated

“But what are you going to _tell_ the child? Am I going to be crazy Uncle Neal, am I even going to _be_ there?”

“That is entirely up to you,” Peter said. “If you want it to know, we‘ll raise it knowing that -”

“That it has two daddies?” There was something mocking in Neal’s voice and Elizabeth put a hand on Peter’s arm to keep him calm, not raise to the bait. Neal was loosing his cool; a tell. He was considering. That was a start, at least.

“It‘s not as crazy as it sounds, Neal. We can make it work if we want it to.” She paused, looked at Peter. Took his hand. “You don‘t have to decide now. Think about it, we won‘t talk more about it tonight.”

“Okay, Elizabeth. I need some air; does Satchmo need walking?”

Elizabeth and Peter stayed on the couch after Neal had left with the dog. Elizabeth snuggled up to him, hid in his arms. They had done what they could.

It was up to Neal now.

“What are you thinking?” she asked Peter.

“He‘s scared. I‘m afraid we‘ve underestimated his commitment issues.”

“I think you underestimate how much he will do just about anything for you.”

Peter scoffed. “If this is going to work, he has to _want_ it, for his own sake, not just for us.”

*

It was the longest week of Elizabeth’s life.

Well, no. The longest week was four years back, before Neal, when Peter had gotten shot on the job.

But it was definitely the longest week since then.

Peter had come home the day after their dinner and told her that Neal, ‘the sneaky little bastard’, had gotten himself transferred onto another team for the rest of the week.

“He‘s going to help them solve some fraud case they‘ve been stuck on for weeks and that‘s, well, that‘s fine, but-”

“But?” Elizabeth asked, handing him a beer.

“I‘m nervous, El. He said he needed some time to think. I hope we didn‘t push him too far.”

“We will just have to wait and see, then.”

The thing was, they both missed him. Neal would usually bully Peter into having long lunch breaks with both of them, which was a nice change from the years of only seeing her husband in the evening. Neal would also come to dinner more often than not, sometime because he and Peter couldn’t let go of a case, most time just for the fun of it.

This week there wasn’t a sound from Neal.

Then Elizabeth got a packet delivered at work.

It was a small clay statuette, about six inches high, of a woman holding a child. In the bottom the initials NC was engraved.

She called Peter immediately.

“Peter, honey. He‘s saying yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language, so feel free to point out my mistakes; it will be much appreciated :)


End file.
